


Emerald

by 55anon (Anon)



Series: Apocrypha [4]
Category: Shingeki no Kyojin | Attack on Titan
Genre: Alternate Lives, Dreams, F/F, Implied Childhood Sexual Abuse, Karma - Freeform, M/M, Reincarnation
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-05-28
Updated: 2015-05-28
Packaged: 2018-04-01 15:39:30
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 740
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4025452
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Anon/pseuds/55anon
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>He kisses the unpierced shell of Erwin's ear.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Emerald

Erwin wasn't always so well versed in politics.  Maria was naive, believing the strength and purity of her vision was enough for them both.  Manipulation came later.

Levi remembers with the clarity of dreams of how their story does not go:

Erwin as a beautiful boy with clear blue eyes, soft yellow hair, drawing the attention of Sina nobles.

Erwin's head bent over his studies, his father tutoring young lords in trigonometry, natural science, and someone's terrible eyes  _wanting_.

They raid his father's house, burn his books, hold trial and execution in the space of a week.  Then under the pretense of pitying the boy, they  _take_  him.

Erwin, clever as he is beautiful, learns the intricate games of a child courtesan.

 

Levi's eyes flicker under his eyelids.  His chest is tight, suffocating.  Erwin's weight is solid.

 

There were other ways their story could have spun itself:

Levi as Commander of legions, as he had in a life past.  And Erwin as pet, the Reiss favourite-- witty, vicious, with clever hands and a wicked mouth, able to destroy the careers of aspiring officers to repay imagined slights.  Erwin, whose pierced ear would hold an emerald earring and whose body, never conditioned as a soldier, would be lithe and sensuous.  His mind warped, trained by a boyhood at the mercy of other men bent on extracting their pleasure from his body.

There are myths in reinkarmic balance.  There is the myth of the beautiful princess who falls in love with a hideously disfigured man, when she could have had any prince in the land.  The gods reveal to her that before they were bodied, her love saw her image and begged the gods to give him all her deformities.  He could not bear his love enduring a life of grief.

In the story which does not happen, Erwin follows Levi, helplessly.  He lives a life emptied of purpose, securing his position among the aristocracy, becoming spoiled with lavish gifts and unfeeling in his power.  He allows himself to be used-- it is all he's ever known.  He capriciously uses others-- he enjoys power.  And when he meets Levi, the pain of the meeting is piercing as death.  Their love is a poisoned thing.

Because rather than fighting Titans openly and plotting humanity's revolution among allies, rather than acting with clear and focused intent, Erwin plays the part of the betrayer.  He becomes traitor, using his influence to manipulate royalty, extract information, sabotage plots.  Levi asks him to fight for humanity.  Erwin lays everything at Levi's feet for a few stolen kisses and aching, hurried nights.  For his treachery, Reiss tortures him, rapes him, and eats him.

By then, the damage is done.  The revolution succeeds.  They save humanity, with fewer lives lost and less time wasted.  Wall Maria doesn't even fall.

Erwin's screams echo as the story unravels, dissolves.

 

His body is warm next to Levi's, hands broad and callused.

 

Levi does not give a fuck about humanity in the face of Maria dying once again betrayed, in agony, alone.  Sina does not allow this story to repeat itself.

Because she too, strikes a reinkarmic balance.  She wants more than a few desperate nights.  She wants  _years._   They'll fight side by side, together.  Erwin will never face the wandering hands of shithead aristocrats.  In exchange, the war will be longer.  They might not even succeed.  Humanity will be brought to crisis.  They will carry the cost of hundreds of thousands of lives on their conscience.

 

Levi opens his eyes.

Erwin's hair, sweat softened, is drying.  Levi traces the familiar paths of strap bruising along his back.  He stretches himself along Erwin's body, savouring all the touches his aches remember.  The emerald of Erwin's tie glows faintly on the beside table, and Levi kisses the unpierced shell of his ear.

Maria would not have made this bargain-- she would have preferred the emerald earring.  Levi knows this full well.  Yet he did not allow the story to write.

Because Maria may always choose humanity, but Sina will always choose Maria.  So Levi endured a life in the filth of the underground city.  So he endured another story.

When he met Erwin, the pain was like a piercing death-- the slow slide of a blade into body.  It's been three years.

Levi follows Erwin helplessly, fighting Titans and humans side by side.  They stand in a blood-soaked revolution.

 

But they have their years.

 

 


End file.
